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There were just a few crawler-based search engines, like Excite, Webcrawler, and Lycos, directories like Yahoo, and very few places where people could announce and seek attention for websites, like Lycos’ TOP 5%.

There was no “link analysis”, no link popularity and no Pagerank, because there was no Google. Search Engine Optimization had nothing to do with link building, and link building was practiced by just a handful of folks like myself. On 286’s with modems.

Link Building Now…

Link Building In 2011 – Everybody cares, but why?

Many reasons, but mostly because some types of links improve your site’s search rank

We now have tools and tactics and schemes and scams for building links, publicity, and “buzz”

1). Direct click traffic
Links can be from pages related to your niche that send you a direct clicks. Example niche:SPEED TV Best Of The Web. Digg, and even Twitter or paid links can bring direct click traffic.

2). Search rank
Links that help search rank will be earned by content merit, originate from source sites engines trust, and be put in place by people who could be described as “curators of quality”. Here’s a great example of a merit based link venue.3). Both
A link that can help rank and send direct click traffic is a rare thing. Your niche’s most trusted source sites are different than mine.4). Neither
A link that can neither help rank or send direct click traffic. The vast majority of web.

Effective link building involves multiple strategies, including

Basics: The links anyone can get – like directories wide and verticalMerit based earned by quality of content:Links from “curators” – those looking for the most useful sites in their niche

In general, the easier any link is to obtain, the less useful that link is likely to beThe specific approach used for any given web site should be different based on each site’s focus, content, and intended audience

A link from a site that’s devoted to upcoming movie releases, like this
A link from a site devoted Disney vacation Club members, like this

The point?

The type of links that help one site are not the same that will help another site, and every site has its own linking potential.

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In Summary…

The links that point to your site tell a story about your site, like a transcript or “rap sheet”

Engines decide if that story is credible, in order to make decisions about your site’s ranking

Since the linking approach required for any given web site must vary depending on that site’s focus, content, and intended audience, then each site deserves its own link building and content publicity plan or blueprint

Your most important decision about links will be which ones to pursue, and why

The text that is within the clickable link above.While I understand it can help search engines understand what your content is about, the most trustworthy pages will NEVER let you control your own anchor text.

The Queen of Trees
Website for a program that looks at the relationship between a Kenyan fig tree and the wasps that pollinate its flowers. Includes background about fig trees in general and about sycamore figs trees in Kenya, a photo essay on sycamore figs and fig was …
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/the-queen-of-trees/introduction/1362/

“Reciprocity”

When two sites link back and forth to each other. Strict rules of reciprocity cannot be perfectly defined, but having a high reciprocity percentage is thought to be a red flag

For some subjects, it is perfectly normal, almost expected, that the link reciprocity percentage should be extremely high. See these two examples.

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